Lord of the Island
by TomPhil
Summary: A new version of my story "The Beast and the Island". This removes the allegory, and tells it simply as an adventure story. Enjoy, and if you wish review.


The boys had been on an aeroplane and could not see what it was like down below because of the clouds which covered the island. Now that he was down on dry land, Ralph saw that he was in a forest. He climbed through the trees, desperate to reach the sunlight. He had been scared since the airport, as he did not like flying, but was at this point lost, on his own, and terrified. Then he heard a voice coming from his left, through the trees, and he turned to see a fat, dumpy boy walking towards him.  
  
They both said hello, and the other boy introduced himself as Percy. Ralph thought that he looked like a pig, and unkindly told him so. This made Percy angry, but he decided to stay with Ralph, as he too was scared of being on his own. They found a shell, and Percy recognised it to be the same as one his friend back at home had. He knew that if you blew on it, it made a loud noise. He hoped that this would make other people on the island come to join them. Not being able to blow it himself, he instead asked Ralph if he would. Ralph blew it, and it made a loud noise.  
  
It took a while, but one by one the other children who had been on the plane started to arrive. Among them were a pair of twins, Sam and Eric, and a little boy named Johnny, who had a strange scar on his face. Then, just when they thought everybody who had been on the plane was there, a scary animal began to emerge out of the trees. It took a long time of shouting and screaming by the crowd already on the beach before it turned out not to be an animal at all, but a group of boys dressed in black.  
  
The boy who was leading the group seemed to be being very nasty to the other boys, but even though he was only the same age as them, they seemed to be doing everything he said. When he told them they could not sit down, they stayed on their feet, even though many of them looked very ill. When one boy fainted, they were finally allowed to sit down.  
  
The boy at the head of the group introduced himself in a very grown-up way, by using his second name - Merridew. Ralph told him their first names: "I'm called Ralph, this is Sam and Eric, this is Johnny, and this is..." He couldn't remember what the fat boy's name was. Then he thought that he remembered: "Piggy." Percy's face went bright red, and he looked angry, but he did not say anything.  
  
The next day they all decided that it would be a good idea to build a fire, in case a boat passed by, so that the people on the boat would see the smoke from the fire and come and rescue them. Jack had an idea that they should use Percy's glasses to reflect light onto the wood, to set it on fire. Everybody except Percy, or Piggy as everyone called him now, thought it was a good idea. Percy wasn't very happy that they used his glasses, because without them he could not see.  
  
As they sat round the fire warming themselves up, they did not realise that some of the nearby trees had caught fire. While the older boys rushed around trying to come up with an idea to put it out, and get the smaller boys out of danger, the smaller boys watched the fire in fear, and thought that they could see evil beasts crawling through it. When the fire went out, everybody had learnt a lesson to be more careful with fire, but the younger boys were still terrified of the beast they thought that they had seen.  
  
A few days later at one of the group's daily meetings, the smaller children were all talking about the scary beast which they said seemed to lurk round every corner. Some of the older boys said that there was no such thing as beasts, but others also claimed to have seen it. The boys started to split into two gangs. The choir dressed up by painting their faces with the juice from the fruit they had picked, and went off to hunt down the beast in the forest, while Piggy and Ralph tried to build huts on the beach to keep them dry from the rain. But Jack would not help, and kept taking his group out hunting, saying that if they didn't find the beast, then it might come and knock down all the huts anyway. These days Jack was becoming increasingly distant from Ralph.  
  
Then one day Ralph saw a boat sailing past. He looked up into the mountain, but saw that the fire had gone out. He and Piggy ran up the mountain, but were unable to relight the fire in time. Just as the boat sailed out of view, Jack arrived with his hunters. They were cheering and celebrating, and this made Ralph angry. He picked up the shell that he had blown into when they first arrived on the island, and blew it again. All the people who were not already there arrived, and he told them how angry he was.  
  
The hunters were not bothered. They had had fun out on the hunt, and were not ready to go home yet. They pretended that they were hunting the pig, to show Ralph how much fun it was. But Ralph remained angry, and refused to celebrate with them. He and Piggy sat alone, and only one of Jack's friends shared food with them. Because Jack had been so rude and so unhelpful, Ralph was very unhappy.  
  
That night the little children could not sleep. They were scared of the beast. Sam and his brother went up into the mountain to relight the fire, hoping that it would scare away the beast, but when they got up there, they saw a shape and they convinced themselves that it was the beast. Ralph, who had thought himself to be too sensible to believe in a beast, now also started to be a little bit scared of it, and joined Jack and the others to hunt it down.  
  
Now only Ralph and Piggy were bothered about being saved or building huts. All the rest of the group wanted to do was to protect themselves from the beast. But then, as everybody got angry, Jack left the others and set up his own gang, which lots of the other boys joined. Then, one night Simon went off for a walk, and when he got back to camp, the other boys, scared that he was the beast, killed him. Also in the camp that night were Ralph and Piggy, who had gone to see if the two gangs could become friends again. When they realised what they had done, they were very upset.  
  
Jack started to be very nasty to his gang. When they did not do what he told them to, he hit them and beat them. He forced them to go and steal Piggy's glasses, which meant that Piggy could not see. Jack needed the glasses to start his fire again, because he had carelessly let it go out. Ralph's gang did not think this was fair, and went to talk to Jack's gang, but then a fight started. Jack pushed Piggy off a cliff in anger, and Piggy hit his head on the way down and died.  
  
Ralph managed to run away, but now Jack told all of his gang to go and get Ralph. Ralph lay in the trees and waited. Jack told his gang to go and kill Ralph. Eric and his brother were the first to find Ralph, but because they were friendly with him they told him to run away. They then changed their minds and went and told Jack where Ralph was. Ralph knew that he could not hide for much longer, and just ran as fast as he could to get away from Jack's gang.  
  
Ralph hid in the trees near the beach. He didn't think that the gang would be able to find him here. And they could not. For three days they looked and looked, but Ralph managed to stay hidden. Then, on the fourth day, he heard whispers, and looked through the trees to see Jack talking to Sam and Eric. Ralph managed to hear only one sentence: "Set fire to as many trees as you can," said Jack. Soon most of the forest was on fire, and Jack's gang stood around the outside to stop Ralph escaping.  
  
Just as the trees in which Ralph was hiding caught fire, he saw a boat nearby. He ran onto the beach and started to wave his hands above his head. One of Jack's gang saw him, but just as he was about to run towards him and beat him up, he turned round and saw the boat. Now more and more of Jack's gang were arriving on the shore. The boat arrived on the beach, and a sailor got off it to talk to the boys.  
  
"We saw your smoke. What have you been doing? Having a war or something?"  
  
Ralph nodded.  
  
"I should have thought that a pack of British boys would have been able to put up a better show than that."  
  
All of the boys started crying, and the sailor walked back onto the ship to wait for everybody to arrive so that the boys could be taken back home. Behind them, flames continued to burn down the forest. The last thing the boys saw as the ship started to move away from the island was something big and ugly looking burning in the flames. 


End file.
